How I Made 20% on Bitcoin in 24 Hours.

I am a bitcoin investor. I say that with a smile on my face. Rarely a day goes by when I’m not checking headlines across the internet to see what the world market is doing with this incredible digital currency. Every person that invests in bitcoin has their own reasons, strategy, and underlying beliefs and principles that guide their decisions. As a owner of many digital media businesses, and a staunch libertarian, my reasons are probably obvious. So in this post I’m going to lay out exactly why, how, and when I invest in bitcoin. I’ll also show you how I used these principles to make 20% in a single day.

My underlying beliefs:

Fiat currency is inherently flawed.
I won’t go into details on the moral/economic reasons why I believe it is a scam, but needless to say, I don’t trust any centralized currency.

Bitcoin is as revolutionary for currency as the Internet was for communication.I am old enough to remember when the internet was invented. I remember the glory of e-mail, and how amazing it was to have someone read your letter immediately. It was truly amazing, and continues to be. Bitcoin has the same “smell” to me. It reeks of revolution. It reeks of change.

The free-market and pop culture will continue to make the confusing be normal.If you can remember when the internet was invented, you may remember how confusing it was to understand what a webpage was. “So you want me to type in http:// what??”, “www. what???”, “NOBODY is ever going to know how to remember this!” We hear the same things about bitcoin today. It REEKS of the early 90s! From the confusing address locations, to the problems spending it online, you will hear the naysayers point to them as examples of how it will “never work”. Either they are not old enough to remember when the internet was invented, or they have a very short memory. Heck- I thought it was crazy that someone would spend $8 to “register” the domain name “www.money.com” in the 90’s. Now, I’m sure they are millionaires! They can ride that pony all the way to the finish line. And new businesses grew up to make this new idea as simple as possible on the end user. Bitcoin will do the same, and will become the new “normal” just like “http://www” and “.com” are now a simple part of every day life.

Bitcoin will continue to grow until it is a major world currency.
I believe in Bitcoin. I think you should too. I believe in it so profoundly, due to the principles of decentralization, scarcity, and it’s digital nature, that I am extremely bullish on it.

Bitcoin will grow whether or not some countries accept it.This is crucial, and why most investors get out when I’m just getting in. I’ll post a bit more about this point and how it related to this particular investment in the next paragraphs. But in short- no one country can take down bitcoin. It’s simply not in their power. And it’s too late.

I won’t sell until I make 15%.I believe so strongly in bitcoin, that I won’t sell any that I have purchased until I make 15%. And that is just on my short-term investments. There is a portion of bitcoin I budget for long-term that I will never sell. I see it as so revolutionary, I fully expect a single bitcoin to at some point be worth anywhere between $48,000 and $3.6 million.

So how did I make 20% in one day?

My bitcoin strategy is divided into a short term, medium-term, and long-term actions. Since one day is obviously the short term- that’s what this post is about. I’ll post in the future about my philosophy on medium and long-term bitcoins.

The short-term strategy

Using the principles above, I scour the headlines every single day to see what the world is saying about bitcoin. I separate what I read into two basic camps: negative news (usually news on nations that are large enough to come down on bitcoin), and the developing marketplace. The developing marketplace (i.e. places to spend bitcoins) are crucial for acceptance. If bitcoin is only a speculative currency, it will never work. Thankfully, the marketplace expands every day.

In the evening of Dec. 17th, my time, China gave some “negative news”. They forbid their banks in dealing with bitcoin. (Albiet they also made it legal for individuals to hold and use them- just at their own risk). Of course, the mainstream media naysayers ran with this as bad news and created a panicked atmosphere of selling. The BTC lost nearly 40% of it’s value, from what I remember, in a single night. When I woke up and read the news, I couldn’t have been happier. You see, NO country can stop bitcoin. (See belief #4 above). It just isn’t possible, and what we saw in the market was an emotional reaction by investors who were scared of the bad press, rather than looking at it rationally. When I read this headline, I IMMEDIATELY purchased more bitcoin. This is my short-term strategy. Follow the news, and purchase more any time negative press makes people sell due to the emotional fear of the currency collapsing. In the stock market- a company can go broke. I do not believe, personally, that a collapse is really possible with bitcoin. I’ll make another post on this point in the future, but for now, just know that I believe if you see people scared of losing their money based on newspaper headlines, they are probably reacting emotionally rather than logically.

So with that, onto the details of the transaction!

Here is the purchase transaction:

As you can see, the price per coin had fallen to $546.79. Imagine the smile on my face as I made this purchase! I watched the price closely over the next day, and using my short-term principle of 15% r.o.i. I began creating my transaction to sell the very next day when it hit that threshold. I made sure to include the coinbase and bank fee into my calculations.

Here is the sell transaction:

Notice the date. In a little over 24 hours I sold the exact same amount of bitcoin at $670.32 per bitcoin. I made 19.85%, including the bank fees. The irony is that I was shooting for 15%, but by the time I finished the transaction I made nearly 20%.

About the author

Justin is the founder of Better Off Bitcoin and the owner of video production company Advanced Video Tactics. He is a familiar a face of bitcoin, public speaker, and early investor. When not publicly speaking on the digital currency, he can be found enjoying fine food and worldwide travel adventures with his lovely wife Katie.